6.  “On the whole it appears, and my argument shows,
     With a reasoning the court will never condemn,
   That the spectacles plainly were made for the Nose,
     And the Nose was as plainly intended for them.”

7.  Then shifting his side (as a lawyer knows how),
     He pleaded again in behalf of the Eyes: 
   But what were his arguments, few people know,
     For the court did not think them equally wise.

8.  So his lordship decreed, with a grave, solemn tone,
     Decisive and clear, without one if or but,
   That whenever the Nose put his spectacles on,
     By daylight or candlelight,—­Eyes should be shut.

Definitions.—­2.  Ar’gued, discussed, treated by reasoning.  Dis-cern’ing (pro. diz-zern’ing), marking as different, distinguishing, 3.  Be-half’, support, defense. 8.  De-creed’, determined judicially by authority, ordered,

LVI.  AN ICEBERG.

Louis Legrand Noble (b. 1813, d. 1882) was horn in Otsetgo County, New York.  When twelve years of age, he removed with his family to the wilds of Michigan, but after the death of his father he returned to New York to study for the ministry, which he entered in 1840.  About this time he published his first productions, two Indian romances in the form of poems, entitled “Pewatem” and “Nimahmin.”  Mr. Noble lived for a time in North Carolina, and later at Catskill on the Hudson, where he became a warm friend of the artist Cole.  After the latter’s death he wrote a memorial of him.  Other works of this author are “The Hours, and other Poems,” and “After Icebergs with a Painter,” from which this selection is taken.

1.  We have just passed a fragment of some one of the surrounding icebergs that had amused us.  It bore the resemblance of a huge polar bear, reposing upon the base of an inverted cone, with a twist of a seashell, and whirling slowly round and round.  The ever-attending green water, with its aerial clearness, enabled us to see its spiral folds and horns as they hung suspended in the deep.

2.  The bear, a ten-foot mass in tolerable proportion, seemed to be regularly beset by a pack of hungry little swells.  First, one would take him on the haunch, then whip back into the sea over his tail and between his legs.  Presently a bolder swell would rise and pitch into his back with a ferocity that threatened instant destruction.  It only washed his satin fleece the whiter.

3.  While Bruin was turning to look the daring assailant in the face, the rogue had pitched himself back into his cave.  No sooner that, than a very bulldog of a billow would attack him in the face.  The serenity with which the impertinent assault was borne was complete.  It was but a puff of silvery dust, powdering his mane with fresher brightness.  Nothing would be left of bull but a little froth of all the foam displayed in the fierce onset.  He too would turn and scud into his hiding place.